Halloween Is Upon Us

Well the boys are in full Halloween mode.  They both love using their imaginations and creative spirit to come up with awesome costumes.  Gee I wonder who they got that from? 😆

Jordan sent me a pic of an outfit he made, including the mask. Not based on anything just right out of his head.  So impressive.

Instead of his standard Batman, Sam dressed up as Negan from The Walking Dead.  I had an old faux leather jacket that I tailored to fit him and also assisted with turning his beard gray.  He went to a Halloween event and said lots of people asked to take their picture with him.

Sam's friend Isaac stopped by to pick him up and I ended up fixing a portion of his makeup. Both looked great.

Uneventful Week

Been dinking around with crafts and old movies this week.

Updated a beach wreath by adding some shells along with buoys made out of wine corks. Damn it was hard to thread the twine into the corks!  Made holes with a screwdriver then a nail then wrangled awhile to get the rope through it.

Ran across some metal tiles that had been painted white.  Repainted them teal then aged them with wax antique paint along with gold. Much better.

Dug out a large piece of driftwood that needed some help.  Glued blue beads, netting, glass balls, and a message in a bottle.  Set it on my dining room table and it looks very artsy.

During my crafting I've been watching Hitchcock along with a few other oldies.  Spellbound, The Paradise Case, Madame X, The Shop Around the Corner.

Now here it is Friday.  Only plans for the weekend is to attend another Norwex party. After that one I hope to be done for the year with these parties!!

Food for Thought

A Little Bit of This and That

Definitely hair is getting longer.  Do you know how hard it is to take a picture of your hair in the back?  Guess I should have used the mirror instead of wrenching my arm behind my head.

Steve arrived yesterday delivering to me my share of the huckleberries along with two pumpkins, including a warted one.  Too cool.

Today he cleaned ducks he had shot Sunday.  Quite the task and thankfully he didn't need my help!!

Stopped by friend Susan's house today to deliver her Norwex items.  We went to sit on the back deck and what was waiting for us? A dead mouse!  Apparently this is a regular routine via the cat.  Still gave me the creeps!

Tonight I made chicken thighs using a recipe from Pinterest.  It is called Holy Yum chicken and it turned out pretty darn good.  Sam joined us for dinner and the decision was unanimous that it was tasty. Here's the recipe:

Holy Yum Chicken

Prep Time

5 mins

Cook Time

40 mins

Total Time

45 mins

 

If you like mustard, then this Holy Yum Chicken is for you! 

Servings: 2 -4

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 - 2 pounds boneless skinless, chicken thighs (most of the fat cut and discarded)
• 1/2 cup Dijon mustard (must be Dijon mustard, no substitutes)
• 1/4 cup pure maple syrup (again, no substitutes. No fake Aunt Jemima stuff)
• 1 tbsp rice wine vinegar, seasoned or unseasoned
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp ground black pepper
• 1 tbsp cornstarch
• 2 tsp fresh rosemary for garnish

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit. Line a 8x8" oven-proof pan with 2 layers of tin foil.
2. In small bowl, whisk together Dijon mustard, maple syrup, rice wine vinegar, salt and pepper.
3. Place the chicken thighs in the foil layered pan then pour the mixture on top of it. Turn the chicken around in the sauce to make sure it gets all coated.
4. Bake, uncovered, for 40 minutes.
5. Remove from oven and let chicken sit for 5 minutes then transfer to a plate. Do NOT discard the liquid.
6. Immediately after plating chicken, whisk in the 1 tbsp. of cornstarch into the liquid in the pan. You'll create a nice, thick sauce to drizzle over your chicken. You need to do cornstarch mixing immediately because the liquid needs to be hot in order for it to thicken properly. If it's still not thickening after 1 tbsp., you can add a little more.
7. Sprinkle rosemary on top before serving.
8. Serve with rice or potatoes or vegetables.

Hair and Hyper Hound

The hair continues to grow!!

I've been using some grow long shampoo and conditioner along with stay in spray conditioner for my thick, coarse hair. Appears to be working well as I'm now able to prepare a bun on the top of my head!  Ponytail on top, folded over, then secured with the last loop.  Hasn't been this long in years!  While it's a nice solution to get my hair out of my way, it won't be an out in public kind of do.

Stubbs was in a frisky mood tonight. Took me about 10 tries to get this shot!

An Evening with Sherlock

Back in the day in my late teens and early twenties, I would party at times until the wee hours.  Arriving home and too keyed up to hit the hay, I would grab a glass of milk (or even make milque toast) and surf the TV.  Now, not much would be on the tube at that hour so it was slim pickens.  You either watched Benny Hill, Monty Python, or a movie.  Perhaps the networks waited until late night to show BBC offerings.

In my case, more often than not I stumbled across a Sherlock Holmes movie.  No, not Robert Downey Jr.  These were black and white classics from the 30's and 40's starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce.

Happened to run across a three movie set of these classics today so had to snatch them up.  Tonight I'm reliving my post-drunken, late night viewing by watching old Basil perform his finest while trading Gin & Tonics for coffee.  Bonus will be no hangover!

Love on this Saturday

Besides being a miserable rainy day, today was also about love.

This morning (after sleeping in until almost 10am!) I watched You've Got Mail. Just love that movie and when Meg and Tom meet up at the end, it's always a sob fest for me!

Then, one of my Facebook friends posted the following love story and it is just so sweet!  It almost gave me another tearfest!

"Just wanted to let all of my Facebook friends know that for the first time in 15 years, I have a partner in my life again. For those of you who do not know my story, I will give a brief recount. All most 30 years ago, I met a handsome young man in Mazatlán, Mexico, while there on vacation. We met in a bar; he did not speak English and I did not speak Spanish. The language barrier didn't stop us from getting to know each other. We traded addresses when we left Mazatlan and agreed to write each other. We did. We were both in college at the time - he began to learn English and took classes in Spanish. 

For probably 5 years we met every summer and fell in love with each other. I was crazy in love with this handsome Mexican man, as my friends who knew then could attest to. Unfortunately, due to language barriers, the distance between us, and a series of unfortunate circumstances, we lost contact with each other. I never forgot him and always wondered where he was, what his life was like now, and if he was happy. 

With the advent of My Space and then Facebook, I began to look for him. He had a common name, but I looked and looked. I knew the search for him would be like searching for a needle in a haystack and that it was unlikely that I would ever find him. Over the years I kept looking for him, hoping that somehow, someway, I would come across his FB page, if he even had one. 

Fast forward to Sunday morning, October 26th, 2014. I had just picked up my phone when it buzzed in my hand with a Facebook Friend Request. To my complete amazement- it was him!!!! At first I thought someone was playing a weird joke on me. But, as I looked at his page, I knew it was him. The beautiful smile, green eyes, and warm brown hair, were the same. I accepted the Friend Request and hastily replied with a text asking if this was the same man I had met in Mexico, so many years before. He laughed and replied it was. We exchanged phone numbers and reconnected. Fast forward again to this week, he is here in Washington with me. He was looking for me for years - I was looking for him for years. I still love him and he still loves me."

Isn't that the sweetest story?  Made me reflect on my own relationship. Almost three years since we met and have been through the ups and downs, heartache and loss, breakups and makeups but in the end we are grateful to be two weirdos who make each other happy.  ❤